The latest season of Fortnite is here, and it takes us to a galaxy far, far away. The new season, titled Galactic Battle, is entirely themed around Star Wars. It’s not just a shiny galactic coat of paint on the standard gameplay though, Fortnite Galactic Battle adds entire new mechanics to the game that make it feel more Star Wars. I started having a realization after I sunk a few hours into the new season, and felt like this reminded me of a game I’ve played before, and I don’t just mean the many other seasons of Fortnite. As I watched the sun setting on the First Order base, holding the lightsaber I fought for in my hand and admiring the view, I realised what I was remembering- it was Star Wars Battlefront.
Now, Star Wars Battlefront was never a full battle royale like this, so I don’t mean that the new season of Fortnite literally is Battlefront. The Battlefront series is a first-person shooter series like Battlefield or Call of Duty, and Fortnite is a third-person battle royale. Still though, the quintessential essence of Star Wars is captured so masterfully in the new Fortnite season that I still felt as if this was a Battlefront experience. Let me break down what makes this new season the Star Wars Battlefront 3 we all wanted, and the things it leaves us wanting for an official third game in the Battlefront series from EA one day.
Twice the pride, double the fall
Let’s start with where we left the Battlefront series, and the reason we’re all missing it. Star Wars Battlefront 2 (the 2017 one) was a great shooter game, but also a complete mess. A historic level of mess in fact, as it maintains its record of being responsible for the most downvoted Reddit comment of all time. Battlefront 2 made players earn character unlocks of Star Wars’ most iconic heroes and villains like Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker through dozens of hours of gameplay. They made players grind for hours to earn a single character, or offered them the option to pay to skip the grind. EA intentionally designed the game to push purchases, and made the game more inaccessible than ever on purpose. EA defended this move as being intended to give players “a sense of pride and accomplishment”, a Reddit comment that went on to receive almost 670,000 downvotes.
The loot box system the game used didn’t just annoy customers, it engaged governments around the world to scrutinize the damage loot box monetization was doing to modern games and their customers. This would even lay the groundwork for legislation against games that use loot boxes, such as mandatory declaration of gambling odds or necessity to declare in-game microtransactions in age ratings across countries around the world.
The backlash that Battlefront 2 received was enormous. It was review-bombed, it was legislated against, and it became the face of corporate greed in gaming. Despite that, it was still a solid shooter in terms of the gameplay. EA did try to redeem it, removing the pay-to-progress and grind-skipping monetization systems, updating the game with free content and making the game the Battlefront 2 we all deserved, but when you’ve been called out internationally by legislators, it’s probably too late to redeem your reputation.
From then, we’ve been without Battlefront. It’s been eight years since we last got a Star Wars Battlefront game, and as a fan of the franchise since its original run back in the early 2000s, I’ve missed it. Fortnite heard my prayers though, as somehow, Battlefront returned. Epic Games gave us the new Galactic Battle season as a full season dedicated to the universe of Star Wars, and I’m finally feeling that Battlefront itch scratched once more.
Somehow, Battlefront returned
Let’s start with one of the biggest changes I noticed right away that made Fortnite feel like Battlefront – there’s no ammo! Instead of the usual shooter mechanic of collecting bullets to load your weapons, Battlefront gives weapons unlimited ammo with an overheating system that builds as you shoot, until it needs to be refreshed, effectively the reload time. Fortnite copies this now, and ammo boxes for the first time have been vaulted map-wide, as they’d serve no purpose. Every single weapon on the Fortnite island is a Star Wars one now, complete with their visuals, sound effects and handling.
If we’re talking about Star Wars weapons, we’re of course all thinking of one in particular: the lightsaber! Fortnite is no stranger to lightsabers, they’ve added them a few times before, but the latest integration goes out of its way to make things more Battlefront-y. Instead of just finding a lightsaber in a chest or a special location, players can find either an iconic Sith Lord or Jedi Knight on the map, and enter the rift in space to train as their respective role, either Sith or Jedi. You enter and then leave the rift in a little animation, coming back to the island trained in the ways of the force and wielding your own lightsaber.
Not only can you swing your lightsaber, move faster, jump higher and remove all fall damage, you can also use force abilities. If you use a Jedi training portal you can push out a Force Push with environment-destroying physics, or for those who went for the dark side you’ll be using brutal Force Lightning. This system is again reminiscent of Battlefront, as players start as a regular foot soldier in most of those games, eventually earning the right to call in (and play as) one of Star Wars’ iconic characters. Fortnite takes a slightly different approach by turning your character into the Jedi or Sith rather than changing you into an existing character, but the end result is the exact same – a brief pause in the fight to return with unstoppable power. It’s a great homage to the Battlefront approach, and a refreshing one for a Fortnite gimmick.
The Star Wars influence is everywhere, and well-realized in plenty of the map locations too. The final thing I noticed that just screamed Battlefront to me was the vehicles. The new season of Fortnite lets players pilot either an X-Wing or a TIE Fighter spaceship, which you guessed it, was another part of Battlefront. It was always a personal favorite of mine to play the game modes that allowed you to soar through the sky (or even space) in one of the Star Wars ships, and it took me back when I took off in an X-Wing over the Fortnite island for the first time. They even offer a quest from Poe Dameron to encourage players to take off and start destroying buildings with its powerful weapons. Combining all these things together, it really feels like Fortnite is giving us something at least partly close to a Battlefront 3.
A new hope?
As much as it may feel like Fortnite has given us the next Battlefront game though, there’s still a lot to be desired we’d get from an actual Battlefront 3. Outside of the obvious differences in gameplay that Battlefront has as a first-person shooter, there’s still more Fortnite is missing. For one, whilst the island’s map does now have a lot of great Star Wars locales, it’s still mostly non-Star Wars related. There are plenty of Fortnite-original locations spread around the map, and they do take you out of the Star Wars immersion. I’d love to see a Battlefront battle royale that merges together Star Wars locations like Fortnite, but on an even bigger scale and without non-Star Wars map points breaking up the immersion.
Fortnite also only offers one truly fleshed out game mode with the battle royale, whilst Battlefront 3 can give us different modes, including entire foot-soldier modes, space combat only modes, and so on. Fortnite restricted its collaboration with Star Wars to just the item shop, its LEGO modes and the primary battle royale mode. The early access Fortnite Ballistic, their first-person shooter mode, has no Star Wars overhaul. Whilst Fortnite does give some quests they’re very bare-bones, whilst Battlefront games of the past have also delivered some good campaign modes.
Overall, the latest season of Fortnite takes some direct inspiration from Star Wars Battlefront that manages to deliver an experience strikingly reminiscent of the best parts of the series at points. At the same time, it makes me wish that EA would finally give us a third game in the rebooted Battlefront series, learning from the mistakes of their past entry, taking inspiration from the Fortnite Galactic Battle season, and give us a new full shooter game set in a galaxy far, far away.
Do you agree with our takes on Fortnite’s latest season and its similarities to Star Wars Battlefront? Do you want to see a new Battlefront game? Let us know your thoughts in the comments down below, and keep your eyes on GameLuster for more gaming news and analysis like this.
